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November 21, 2003

My two favorite snacks lately

- Fresh pita bread from the natural foods store, toasted, spread with quark* and sprinkled with zaatar. The bread looks very doughy and unassuming in its untoasted state, just a white squashy oblong with no character to speak of. But in the toaster oven it puffs magnificently and turns a perfect golden brown. Then it's crispy and chewy and tender all at once, and so very, very good. I only wish it were cheaper. Obviously what I need to do is to learn to make my own. The key would be to catch them at the right point of underdoneness to replicate the effect, and so they don't dry out in toasting. I may make this a project for the next time I am desperately looking to avoid work.

- Ochazuke, which is rice with green tea poured over top (usually with savory seasonings, as well) to make a kind of thick rice soup. It sounds not so good, but after reading enough people's plaudits, I decided to give it a try, and it makes a very tasty soothing snack, perfect, as one site says, for late evening. The seasoning I've been using is a pretty basic sprinkle with wakame and little rice crackers. But there are many more elaborate packaged ochazuke mixes, many of which include powdered tea, so that you only need to add rice and boiling water. There's even (of course) a Hello Kitty ochazuke mix, with little kitty-face nori. I wanted to link to a picture for you, but I guess the site where I saw it has sold out, because it doesn't seem to be there anymore. OH WELL. Trust me when I tell you that it was remarkable.

*There was a nice article about quark in last week's New York Times food section, but it's no longer publicly available. I'm very frustrated with how rapidly the Times moves its articles to the pay-only archives these days. This is churlish of me, I suppose, but arrgh!

posted by redfox at 10:35 AM (etcetera) | Comments (1)

November 16, 2003

Geek type one, meet geek type two

Now there is RecipeML. Once S. fully explains to me what the point is of XMLizing my recipes, I may go back and do it. You all can try explaining it too, if you're so inspired. I seem to have a little block where it comes to this question.

S: "Look, there's [foo]ML now! Neat! Check it out!"
Me: "Oh, totally cool! Um, why?"

posted by redfox at 10:14 AM (etcetera) | Comments (0)

November 13, 2003

Haut Chocolat

Oh dear. Today the Vosges chocolate catalogue arrived on my doorstep. Alas that it did not come with a complimentary bar of Naga, which is the most delectable flavored chocolate bar of all time. (I owe my acquaintance with it, as well as my gratitude for getting to have a WHOLE BIG BAR of my very own, to the lovely and generous John and Jen 13.) It turns out that we could have had a Naga wedding cake. Our far less schmancy classic Pittsburgh burnt almond torte was perfectly delicious and thematically harmonous, and I wouldn't have wanted it any other way, but Naga! Cake! Naga cake!

On the other hand, I don't think I'm quite ready for the "Vincent gallo" savory chocolate line, although they do have a point in that cheese and chocolate go well together when they are not combined in the selfsame piece of food. But yeah, not right now, thanks.

posted by redfox at 07:37 PM (etcetera) | Comments (6)

November 08, 2003

Foods of convenience

Today I became curious enough about the widely lauded American Flatbread frozen pizza (and lazy enough after hours and hours of grading) to give it a try. A thread on ye olde eGullet had recently confirmed my suspicions that there really is not much in the way of good pizza to be had in my neck of the woods, whether upscale or down, which also contributed to this impulse buy. And whaddyaknow, it really is tasty. Not as good as homemade, but almost, and certainly a hell of a lot better than anything you can get delivered to your door. Cheaper too, though I suppose it's expensive as frozen pizza goes.

posted by redfox at 09:08 PM (dinner reports) | Comments (0)

November 07, 2003

Yogurt

I just read Corby Kummer's recent article about organic yogurt. We normally get the whole milk yogurt made by the "big organic" dairy he mentions, Stonyfield Farm, though I no longer devour big bowls of it with honey and walnuts, the way I did my senior year in college. It's mainly reserved for eating alongside curry, or in the occasional summer raita. But today when I was at the co-op I saw a tub from Butterworks, the smaller organic dairy discussed in the first half of the article. I would normally have passed it by, since there was only nonfat, but having read Kummer's encomium of the stuff, I was intrigued.

And damned if it isn't, in fact, "a thing of delicate beauty." As he says, "It breaks into miniature canyons and bluffs, like junket. What Lazor calls a "tender set" results from the absence of the jelling agents that other manufacturers usechiefly pectin (found in fruits and used in jams) and starch. The flavor is lightly sour, with none of the harsh vinegar sting of many unflavored yogurts. It's just tart enough to be refreshing." All true. I may need to stock up on walnuts and honey.

posted by redfox at 05:47 PM (etcetera) | Comments (0)

November 04, 2003

Quinoa, roasted things, and spinach

About an hour and a half ago, I found myself not in the mood to grade a single additional paper, but conveniently fried out in all my higher thinking faculties by virtue of the papers I did grade. So it was a nice night for making something particularly tasty-healthy for S. He's been digging quinoa lately, and so have I -- the texture is so light and chewy and enticing -- but I have been a lazy, lazy girl and making the kind that comes in a box with a flavor packet (from the organic convenience food brand Seeds of Change, very tasty but a big salty processed whammo of non-virtue). Instead, tonight I am emulating the quinoa with caramelized onions and cauliflower we had at Café Atlantico.

I took half a head of cauliflower and sliced it very thin, in about 1/4" slices, so it crumbled nicely. I cut a medium leek (white only, of course) into fine half-circle chiffonade and washed the hell out of it. All together, tossed in a bit of olive oil and salt, then roasted a long time at about 400° F, until everything was toasty and caramelized-y. Then I prepared some plain quinoa with bullion, which is very very easy, by the way: you just toast it in a little oil and then add twice as much liquid as you have grains, turn down to a low simmer, cover, and cook for 15 minutes. Then I folded in the roasted vegetable bits and adjusted for seasoning, especially pepper.

Alongside: the aforementioned spinach salad. Yum!

Meanwhile: It's unseasonably hella warm here this week, as the kids say, and so the windows are open. And boy, the people next door are having quite an argument, with lots of wailing and yelling and "motherfucker"ing. I think a teenager is involved, which would explain a lot, I guess.

posted by redfox at 08:02 PM (dinner reports) | Comments (1)

Notes on spinach salad

This weekend I was in Pittsburgh for a conference. Thanks to the Pittsburghness, I could conveniently stay with my mother, who made me tasty treats. Saturday night she made a lovely baked pasta dish, but the thing I couldn't eat enough of was the spinach salad. I was reduced to a state of chittering "salad salad salad," and I even finished the forkful she left in her own bowl. Once upon a time, I hated raw spinach as much as I loved cooked spinach, but clearly I have turned a corner. My mother claims there was nothing much special about it, but here are some things I observed, and will use in trying to make it for myself:

(1) Really very nice baby spinach from the farmer, not the torn and bruised stuff you get in the prewashed bag.
(2) Hard-boiled egg, cut into wedges and tumbled up a bit more with a fork.
(3) Homemade croutons.
(4) A vinegary, mustardy salad dressing, made with shallots.

I know, it doesn't sound particularly unusual, but oh mercy I could eat absurd quantities of this stuff.